American Thanksgiving was this past week, and we have much to be thankful for – 2016 has been an incredible year! Thank you for being part of it. Below is a brief update on two of our major projects as well as exciting news about our work visas. As always, if you have any questions, want more information, or are willing to send us an update as to what is happening in your neck of the woods, we'd love to hear from you!

HAITI – The new software Tom coded for Radio Lumière, a Christian radio station in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, is ready to be installed and used. He departed for Haiti this morning (November 30th) to install it at the station in Port-au-Prince and provide training on its use. While there he will also be helping repair some of the damage endured during recent Hurricane Matthew. Please pray for his safety while he's away. The boys and I will sure miss him for the two-and-a-half weeks he'll be gone, but I'm so thankful he gets to see the end result of months of hard work.

Port Au Prince, Haiti
(Photo by Fred W Baker III)

CONGO – This past January I (Candice) served at Pioneer Christian Hospital, a missionary hospital in the Republic of Congo. Upon my return I wrote to you about the hospital having insufficient resources to provide food for patients and how we were working diligently to overcome this (read more about my time in the Congo here). Even though we made strides toward securing food from local (to Congo) aid organizations for the most vulnerable of patients, it became apparent as 2016 progressed that those food sources are not reliable.

A photo I took in January at Pioneer Christian Hospital

Furthermore, it was always our goal to provide food for all patients, regardless of nationality or nutritional status. In response to this, we launched a funding campaign to supply the hospital with much needed food so every patient, whether refugee, outcast member of society, widow, orphan, or anybody in between, would be nourished while at the hospital. The funding campaign was launched in September (hosted by Global Outreach Mission, the mission organization that runs the hospital) with the goal of raising $42,000 by year-end.

I've spoken with many of you about the hospital and how dear it is to my heart, so I'm overjoyed to report that, as of right now, we only have $6,000 to go to reach our $42,000 goal! This will provide the hospital with over one year's supply of food. Thank you for praying with us for this.

Dr. Harvey of Pioneer Christian Hospital assessing a patient

We asked for this need to be filled by year's end, and He has provided!!

For more information on this endeavor or to contribute to the fund for food, follow this link. Global Outreach Mission is a registered charity in both Canada and the USA, so all donations will receive a receipt for tax purposes. Please note that Global Outreach Mission is bound by charity confidential laws, and thus cannot notify me if someone donates – so please, please let me know if you did so I can thank you personally!

WORK VISAS – With the upcoming change in the American government, we felt it important to renew our work visas prior to the change in office, so last week we drove to the Canadian/American border and reapplied for our TN-1 work visas and, praise the Lord, they were granted! Thank you to everyone who has been praying about this. We are very relieved. We are now able to work in the United States for the next three years or until the NAFTA agreement is renegotiated/canceled (this is on the new government's 'to do' list for the first-100 days in office). So although we rejoice that we currently have valid work visas, it remains a prayer request to be able to remain in the USA for years to come – because there is much work to do!

For those who provide annual or spontaneous one-time gifts towards our ministries at year-end, there are three ways you can do so:

Mail a cheque to the respective address below, indicating account 4110555 (Canada) or 110555 (USA) in the memo line.

Give online via this link (Canada) or this link (USA). On the Canadian site, please choose ‘Donate to a missionary’ from the dropdown list and write Scatliff 4110555 in the comment box.

Thank you for your support of our ministries through 2016, and we very much look forward to taking on 2017 together. Until then, may the peace, joy, hope, and love of Christ fill your home this Christmas season.